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Report: Tampa's Checkers fast food chain to be put up for sale seeking $500 million

 
Tampa-based fast food chain Checkers Drive-In Restaurants will reportedly be put on the sales block by its private equity owner, [TImes file photo]
Tampa-based fast food chain Checkers Drive-In Restaurants will reportedly be put on the sales block by its private equity owner, [TImes file photo]
Published Jan. 18, 2017

TAMPA — Tampa-based fast food chain Checkers Drive-In Restaurants will soon be put on the sales block by its private equity owner with a hopeful price tag of near half a billion dollars.

So says a Bloomberg news report.

"Sentinel Capital Partners, which bought Checkers in 2014, is working with investment bank Piper Jaffray Cos to sell the company," Bloomberg stated, citing unidentified sources.

Related coverage: A Checkers fast food success story takes the road less traveled

The Checkers double drive-through concept was born in 1986 in Mobile, Ala., but did not become a national player until moving its headquarters to Tampa Bay a few years later and merging with Rally's. Checkers merged with Rally's, a similar concept in the Midwest, in 1999. The two brands share menus, the checkerboard and chrome styling, and red neon signs. Only the name out front is different between the Southern and Midwestern restaurants.

There are now more than 800 Checkers and Rally's, with major expansions under way. Checkers wants to add as many 100 burger restaurants to North Texas' already crowded fast-food landscape. a Crain's Dallas story reports this week.

Checkers generates about $700 million in sales, according to Sentinel Capital's website. Officials with Checkers and New York-based Sentinel Capital could not be reached for comment.